Good evening everyone. I'd like to welcome you to the Atgo City Council. Tonight is Monday, January 26. Audrey, can you have the record show that our city attorney is online? It appears our city planner is present. Our city engineers present. Council member Dunlap
is present. Council member Gaty is absent. Council member Tanner is present. Council member Lond is present along with our city administrator. At this time, I'll ask you all to join us for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the
United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Our first item of business this evening
is our open forum. This is the portion of the meeting where you can come to the podium, state your name and address, and limit comments to five minutes or less. Would anyone like to speak at this time? Kathy Kohl's, 15613th Street Northeast. Bringing you my monthly picture of No Fence at the grocery store next door,
just so that it's on record. We have made some minimal progress. Um and then we'll let you know about that. But here's Thank you, >> Mayor. Uh Coburn's had contacted the city regarding an escrow that from their
expansion project. Uh they were advised that that escrow will not be refunded until the uh fence issue is resolved. Um that was mid December and we let Miss Kohl's know uh that they had reached out and were in contact. Um but we haven't
received a response. So, we'll follow up with them now that the holidays are over. >> Any other comments? All right, we will close the open forum and move on to consider our agenda for approval. Does anyone have anything that they would like to add or delete at this time?
>> Madame Mayor. >> Yes, Ryan. >> I'd like to bring down item 3.3 to make that 6.1. Okay, >> mayor. >> Yes, >> staff would like to remove item 3.20 from the agenda. Uh we'll have a
revision to the ordinance and place it on a future agenda. >> Okay, >> Madame Mayor. >> Yes, Ryan. >> I move to approve the agenda as written or as amended. Second. >> Motion by Ryan, seconded by Corey. Is there any discussion?
All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. Moving on to our consent agenda. A motion would be in order. >> Madame Mayor, >> that's Ryan. >> I move to approve the consent agenda as amended. >> Second.
>> Motion by Ryan, seconded by Corey. Is there any discussion? Madre, you have the items removed. Thank you. >> All right. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Motion
passes. Moving on to item 4.1 is the Great River Center of Osteigo 8th edition. I'll turn this over to the city of CL. >> Thank you, Mayor. Boss swim school had submitted application for uh subdivision of an outlaw east of the Great Good Day
Car Wash adjacent to Parson Avenue and 85th Street. Uh so the applications include preliminary plat uh vacation of existing drain engine utility easements. Uh they've also submitted a sketch plan illustrating how the lot is proposed to be developed uh with a 9600 foot swim
school along with a potential future 11,900t retail building. Uh once the preliminary plat is processed uh depend on city council consideration uh they would have future applications both for final plat to establish the lot and then also uh
site and building plan review which is subject to review by the planning commission and approval of the council. Uh so the site again is at the northwest corner of Parson Avenue and 85th Street. uh comprehensive plan guides the site for commercial land uses and it's part it's zoned within the PUD district for
uh Great River Center of Atgo which allows B1 retail district uses. So the instructional class indoor recreation use for the swim school would be allowed as a permitted use uh again subject only to site and building plan review. Uh the area is developing with uh
serviceoriented businesses, the car wash immediately to the west. Two dayc carees, a real estate office, a tire shop, and a bank to the north. Uh the village apartments is located directly east of the site. They are submitting application for their second phase. So they'll build their building up to
Parson Avenue across from it. Uh this is a good use for this site. It's going to attract uh regional patrons as well as uh provide a unique service uh in Otgo that will be well suited to uh the growing community. The preliminary plat is pretty straightforward. This is one
existing outlot that was platted when the car wash developed. Uh it's two just under three acres in area just over 300 feet in width. The PUD district doesn't have minimum lot area width requirements, but uh these both exceed the requirements that would apply in the
base B1 zoning district. Uh and as shown on the sketch plan, obviously they can't accommodate development of the site in compliance with the zoning ordinance. Uh there is no rightaway dedication with the plat having previously dedicated that with the great river center edition and uh any amendments with the uh car
wash plat as well. Um city attorney or city engineers reviewed the utility plans. Uh there were pipes in the ground uh to serve the site uh for development. So those are basically uh plugandplay type operations. Storm waters handled regionally within the development, although they will have to provide some
infiltration within their site. Uh the easements shown on the north, east, and south lot lines of the outlot will be vacated and replaced by new ones dedicated with the final plat. Uh there is no park dedication within Great River Center. Uh the original developer satisfied those requirements with trail
uh connections through that and then there would be a development contract uh with approval of the final plaid. Again, they provided the sketch plan illustrating uh how they would develop the site. The proposed swim school is at the southeast corner of the building. Uh
the future retail building at the northeast corner. Uh the important thing with the layout is that they push the building over towards Parson Avenue mirroring what uh all the structures on both sides of the roadway between 85th and 87th have done consistent with the PUD design guidelines. Uh they also
showed that they have um more parking than required by the zoning ordinance. And as I said at the planning commission, anyone that's been to a fost swim school knows the importance of that. Uh that was the one item that the planning commission did discuss is is there enough parking on site and will
the access work for the site and we address that. We're confident that basically they have enough parking. They're the experts. They're exceeding our requirements. So we don't have uh any cause to uh question that. uh the site does have multiple access points
and circulation should be adequate to distribute traffic based on the capacity of heat roads. So uh everything else will review in greater detail as part of the site and building plan applications when that comes forward. Uh the planning commission expressed their uh interest and looking forward to that. So uh
planning commission did hold a public hearing on January 20th uh to consider the application. There were no public comments. Mr. between Boris of uh Posum School was present to address the planning commission's questions. Uh after their discussion, they voted 6 to zero to recommend approval. Uh that
approval would be subject to 11 conditions that city staff has presented in resolution 20268 for your consideration. >> Thank you. Does the applicant wish to comment? >> Hi, my name is Dwayne Boris. I'm with
Boss Swim School. Um, again, just want to kind of echo the comments I brought uh last Tuesday. Dan has been more than helpful. Uh, we greatly look forward to hopefully receiving your approval and moving forward. Um, we do have some schools as was brought up quite
frequently about Maple Grove, but we looking where our current schools are with Maple Grove and Blaine. This is a way to serve even further out and beyond. And we have plenty of current customers that already live north of here. So, we know we're gonna make capacity at the other schools as well as
pick up customers here. So, we're really excited about being part of the SEO community. >> Great. All right. Maybe if you want to stay there just so now we'll turn this over to the council. They have any questions for you or for staff. Corey,
>> thank you. Uh Mr. Boris, I I'm really excited about this. I mean, my kids went to Foss. I uh I know what a what a good place it is and how popular it is. I think what excites me more is what may come with it. Um, you know, families
coming in, um, triggering, you know, food and retail and, uh, so I I I think it's wonderful and so many young families here in Sego. So, >> no, agreed. Uh we've done a lot of due
diligence about demographics and and the expansion and yeah, this makes it a lot of sense for us to get here as families continue to build here that we'll be able to provide them with the service we do. >> Are you guys based out of Minnesota or Prairie? >> Okay. I think you have 13 different
locations as >> we have 33 >> in Minnesota. 12 here in Minnesota, nine in Chicago, five in St. Louis, four in Denver, and then one in Fargo, one in De Moine and one in Madison. >> Wow. >> Awesome.
>> Very good. Well, thank you. >> Any other questions or comments? >> All right. And then if there's no questions or comments, Corey, >> Madame Mayor, I'll make a motion to adopt resolution 20268 approving a
preliminary plat for the Great River Center of uh Seagull 8th edition. >> Second. Motion by Corey, seconded by Michelle. Is there any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. I.
>> All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. >> Thank you. Excited to have >> Thank you. >> See you soon with some points. >> See you soon. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right, moving on to item 5.1 is fire department staffing. And we will turn
this over to our interim fire chief. Thought Jason was taking it. You got have two and I >> Yeah, I know. I was confused, too. >> Mayor, council, thanks for your time tonight. Um, we have a a presentation that we're going to go through. So, Adam and I will coordinate this together.
He's like Vanna. >> Yes. >> Thank you for that. So, uh, >> the hair, >> well, in many ways he is, but many ways he isn't. >> So, when I first talked to city staff
back in August about this interim fire chief's position, um, it was going to be short term. This is my third one, and I I know that we don't know how long it's going to be till we get into the position. Um, but when we first talked in August and I started in September, uh, we were talking about trying to
start the recruitment process for the future fire chief late last year, um, we slowed that process down a little bit in the hopes that we could get some shared services, fire district, um, discussions going. We've talked to a lot of our potential partners and that's just
simply something you can't rush. I mean, it's got to be something you do right and you take your time. You got to have willing partners that it's the right time for them, it's the right time for us. So, it was good that we slowed down and there was a lot of work that we did in the last few months, but it's getting to the point where we really need to to
hire your your future your your future leader. Um, let's see. The the previous timeline that we had in your I think um the previous director presented to you last year um a timeline of when to hire
people this year in 2026 and it's just um not enough time. and we'll kind of walk through that um tonight as to why we kind of want to move up some of those hiring dates. Um and again, we've done a lot in the last several months, but now there's a lot of decisions that really
need to be part of that future leaders um decisions and in that person's um team. Um and it really starts a domino's effect. So the the fire chief should be the easiest one. We had that position. It was an approved position. It's nothing new. It just was called director
before. We changed the title of fire chief. same same pay, same position essentially. Um but again, it starts to create the domino effect. So what we're hoping in the next um several weeks is that we present to you um the idea of hiring the fire chief and that fire
chief's three full-time captains and get those captains on board sooner so they can play a role in helping train and recruit the part-time firefighters. That's probably the most timely thing. Um, and again, I'll go through each position um, individually, but when you look at recruiting in your community,
trying to find out the true interest level is for a part-time position. Um, typically, um, if you talk to any of the cities around us or any of the cities in the state, you might get a lot of people that are interested in part-time positions until they really find out what the time commitment is, uh, the training commitment, and then the
ongoing commitment from there. So, the sooner we can get going on recruiting part-time firefighters, the better. So, we'll know where we're at. uh we could have firefighters that come through the door from other cities that have a lot of training and experience or we could have citizens that have no training. And that really makes a big difference on how long it's going to take to get them
ready to respond. But typically, um and again, I'll go through this in a little bit more detail, but once you get a firefighter, a part-time firefighter through the door, if they have no experience, it takes five months to do the firefighter training and two months to do the first responder training. So,
they're all ready to go. uh in the previous plan um the previous director had us hiring the part-time staff in September and if you start doing the math it's just not going to work. So working with um the training departments that would come in and help us with training u we really need to start this
training by June. My recommendation is you need obviously need the chief on board before that time and I'd like to see the three captains on board before that time so that our captains can assist in our training of our firefighters which I think is critical. Um, so again, kind of got the the
pyramids of the different positions there. We'll talk about getting the fire chief on board hopefully by April. The captains would be suggested in May. Part-time firefighters, that's the critical one. They have to start in June to be able to be ready by the by the first of the year of 2027. That's coming
up quick. And then the full-time firefighters, not as critical. But I was at Metro Fire Chiefs today and I kind of was doing my a little poll of fire departments that have recently hired um full-time firefighters and full-time firefighters are going to come through the door experience. They're going to come through the door either as
part-time firefighters at other communities or part or full-time firefighters at other communities. But still, you want to train them to your equipment, your city, your standards. And that usually takes four to six weeks is what I'm learning from other departments.
Um, if you go to the next slide, uh, fire chief's responsibilities. Again, what you need now is to get your future leader on board. Hopefully, it's a long-term leader, somebody that's going to be here longer than the previous director and your your current interim chief. You need somebody that's going to be on board hopefully for five plus
years and get a good foundation set. Um there's a lot of things that we've done, but now that person needs to weigh in on some of the operational pieces that we've been holding off on that aren't critical yet, but they're getting to be critical from a timing standpoint. Um already mentioned it's a budget
position. It was budgeted for last, I believe, since 2022. I believe you had the director or fire chief and your budget of some sort. Um, the fire chief obviously continues to build on the community, uh, work with city council, city staff, operational decisions,
um, plays in a role of selecting the full-time captains, engaging and attracting part-time firefighters, that's going to be critical in our community. And I think if I was somebody that lived in the community, I really want to know who I'm going to be working for, who the fire chief's going to be. Um, so hopefully our our goal is, if we
get your approval tonight, is to post that position yet this week. have already been doing some soft recruiting with the Metro Chiefs and uh Minnesota State Chiefs, letting them know that hopefully that position is forthcoming soon. Um, this is a pretty aggressive timeline, but we'd like to close the
process in February, start interviews in late February and March, pre-employment stuff, and hopefully get that person to start in April. Again, pretty aggressive with city government. It takes time to go through all those steps with any of the fire positions, all the fire positions from part-time firefighter to the chief. Um, you want to make sure
you're doing background check. You want to make sure you're doing a physical to uh NFPA standards and you want to make sure you're doing a psychological on all the positions and all those things take time just to get done. We can go to the next slide please. Fire captains. Um
so in the old plan it was uh planned to have the captain start in November 1st of this year. Again that's pretty unrealistic to have your future leaders starting in November. Um there's still a lot of work to be done. There's policies and procedures. There's um new equipment that's arriving. Our our, for example,
our two Pierce trucks are going to be arriving in June. Within 30 days, we get free training from the factory. So, the idea would be the captains would become the trainers that train everybody else, kind of train the trainers. Um, and again, if we can get our three captains
on board and have them involved with training our new firefighters, it'll save us money from we use an outside company to do the initial firefighter training. um it would be on week nights at our station, which would be kind of cool using our training props and our our equipment versus sending them to
another city. But if we can get the captains on board, it not only starts to build that team um camaraderie, but it also saves us money because we don't have to hire so many outside instructors. Um so again, our goal is to hopefully have those captains starting in May,
which means that we'll come back in February to ask for um permission to to start that process. And if you can go to the next slide, please. Part-time firefighters. Again, initially, this was planned to have them hire hired in September. Um, working
with the company that does a lot of training in this area. That's just not realistic. They need the whole five months. And that's, if you can think about it, I mean, that's folks that are coming in for these positions have full-time jobs, so they can't train during the day. This is training two nights a week. That's pretty aggressive throughout the summer. So, that's quite
a commitment on part of um future part-time firefighters. Um they'd get done with their firefighter training in October and go right into first responder training with the line of staff at our station with our staff, which would be again kind of neat. Um and they'd get that done right before Christmas. So, they'd be ready to go in
January. But you can see how critical the timing is of this now. And if you can go to the next slide, please. And then the full-time firefighters, it's an interesting market. And I know I've mentioned this before, but the metro area, there's over 100 positions that were created this year. Um, partially because of federal
grants that cities got and then partially because of cities starting to switch more to full-time staffing. So, it's a very um aggressive market right now. We don't want to start advertising too soon and not hiring people because we'll we'll waste a lot of time creating a list and more than like a lot of those
people won't be around anymore. Uh, but having them start in December, which was the initial plan, is not enough time. Um, the other critical part of firefighters, um, back when I started in the 80s, it was literally go pick out a set of turnout gear. It was long coat and boots that you pulled up and it was
kind of small, medium, large. Now, because of OSHA standards, every firefighter has to be custom fitted for their turnout gear. Once they're custom fitted for their turnout gear, depending on the brand, it's 60 to 90 days to get that gear. So, start to do the math. We didn't hire firefighters till December.
It would take, you know, that much longer. There are companies that rent turnout gear. So for short term you can do it. They really recommend that that's good for training but you really don't want to be using it for actual response. Um so what we're recommending is getting the uh the full-time firefighters on
board in that October November time frame. Go to the next slide please. So the next slides um several of them look at just what the year looks like because again once you you know you think we're not almost almost into February we have plenty of time but once you start to
play this out so this first one looks at the full year and then the next one it just breaks it down into quarters u but I'll start with the fire chief you know the recruitment process the pre-employment process and then getting that person on board same with the captains and the key to me is that
part-time part-time firefighters that's that's really the the main part of your fire department, 20 part-time firefighters. Um it's critical that we have that process starting um in no later than March and going through the all the hire hiring process and
recruiting and hiring and testing and having them start in the first part of June to get the training done and then the full-time firefighters and then um you know so it also shows training. It's one thing to get all the state state certifications the um for
firefighter and hazmat and all the different certifications somebody needs and the first responder but then you know if these folks are coming here and they don't know at Seaggo we need to make sure they know at Seagull we need to make sure that city staff knows them they know their way around they know our policy procedures they know our equipment so there's all that
orientation of how we do stuff in seagull the next couple slides I think we can go through quick good job Vanna um and then Keith key considerations. Um so time sensitive factors um again I was
intended to be short-term. You really need to get that that permanent chief in the in this role. Now um training mentioned all that it's a huge liability if we don't do training properly especially for the part-time firefighters. we don't properly train and equip our firefighters and they go
out and do something that gets them hurt or some of our citizens hurt that as you can imagine is a huge liability and they have to have all their state certifications. Uh I mentioned the turnout gear. I think the big thing is and I really like this it's it's training with our city
equipment at our fire station. Um it's pretty exciting when you go through the station now and see all the training features that are starting to be able to be seen in the station um with our fire fire leadership team. So instead of sending the firefighters out to another city or you know you can send them to
Centry College, you could send them to any of there's several colleges but training them here at our station in our training room and using our live training props and taking them outside and training with our trucks. That's just get getting that much further ahead. Plus, it really puts the station
in service this summer for training, which is pretty exciting. Um, ongoing items. Uh, minimum staffing. It's a great subject. I mean, four is by far up uh where you want to be for four people on a truck. Unfortunately, in Minnesota,
it's it's um the reality is a lot of departments are running with two or three people. Is that right? Does it meet the two in two out? No. Um there's transitional firefighting. Um, I can get into a lot of details to that. Um, the goal here, I think the thing to remember here is this is your foundation. This
you're building on the future. This isn't the end game for um the city of Otagle with the fire department. I know there's discussions about do you need another station over on the west side of the community. You do you know when you need need that depends on a lot of different factors. Um, the goal here
would be, and we did this in Shakipi, is to have three full-time firefighters on and try to supplement that with one part-time firefighter. So, ideally, you'd always try to have four on. Is it going to happen all the time? No. Um, even with full-time staff, you have people that are sick on paternity
leaves, um, the new leave that we take in Minnesota now, training, you know, firefighters have to do ongoing training. They can't do that always on shift. So, sometimes they're gone on training. So, you're not always going to have even the three full-time people on, but the goal would be to try to have four people on as often as possible. And
you have to remember that yes, you're staffing with three, two, or three or four, but you still have your part-time people that you're paging out for those major calls. You're paging them out for structured fires. No different than any of the other departments around us. Um, shared services conversations. I
know I' I've said it many, many times. Um, it's the it's the wave of the future in Minnesota. We had discussions after the metro chief's meeting today about shared services and how we really in Minnesota need to start having serious conversations about shared services,
fire districts, whatever term you want to use. Um I wish I hope the state's doing a uh an assessment on fire services in Minnesota. Um you know we have a little under 800 fire departments. That's is that's a lot of fire departments. And I'm hoping out of that assessment comes the realization
that the state needs to start to encourage fire departments to look at this. You know, how do you do that? Maybe financially, do you have some incentives, grants? I think there's a lot of different opportunities that state could do to help fire departments and cities decide that might be worth discussing um fire department um
consolidations. We're not done talking about it. You guys aren't done talking about it. When we're looking for the fire chief of the future, we need to make sure that person's on board with collaborative um not only team continuing the team building that we are working on here with our public safety partners, but
being collaborative and wanting to talk about shared services and wanting to continue those subjects. Um and then you know what the city gate had the little memo attached to the packet tonight.
One of the things that they suggest, and I would strongly suggest you do it, is having city 8 do a small roadmap for the future. They weren't hired to do a full study. A full study is 50 to $75,000 depending on what you have them study. But I think it would be good to spend some of the money that we set aside for
city 8 to at least set up a small road map for the future so you guys have no surprises coming up. You kind of know what the future holds. Um, we've talked about a fire marshal and how important that's that is with your growing community with all the development going and and honestly some of the
redevelopment or the remodeling going on with some of your existing buildings. A fire marshall would be an important aspect. A city uh or excuse me, an emergency manager would be important aspect. So, I think having city a just do a small road map for the future would be very helpful for you and the future fire chief. Um, administrative support.
Um, there's a lot of different options down the road. And then the other thing to bear in mind is once you are a fire department. So you have to be able to to get your fire department identification number. You have to be able to have trucks, staff, station, and be have the
ability to respond to calls. Once you can do that, you can get your fire department identification number. Once you get that, then you can apply for federal grants like the safer grants, which is staffing uh grants, federal grants. Minnesota's been a um because we relied so long on uh volunteer staff by
so many departments, Minnesota's been getting a lot of safer grants, a lot of big safer grants. It just shows you that that volunteer model, which has been something I loved my whole life, is slowly starting to fall apart and we need to look at options down the road.
um utilizing staff. I think again it' be a big benefit to have your fire chief and your captain on board for recruiting part-time firefighters. I also think it'll work good for full-time firefighters because wherever you hire your captains from, they may know of staff that would want
to come and work for those captains or the fire chief. Um mentioned the fire captains can aid in training. We got the firetruck training coming up in June. the the two pierce fire trucks for the ladder truck just started being built I think two weeks ago now and uh it's
scheduled to be done in May. It'll be delivered to us by middle of June. Uh ladder trucks by far the most complicated piece of equipment to train on. And again there's a lot of things that the the captain should play a part of. When I mentioned the u the equipment
that's operational decisions, um self-contained breathing apparatus, there's like three major brands, they all work fine. They all have different features. It really depends on the crews, what they like, what they like to wear. Um that should have a lot of influence on that rescue equipment,
turnout gear brand. I mean, all that stuff we could order, but it's really one of those those things that um if you're going to be the user, you want to have some say on it, some buy in on it. Uh we still got a lot of work to do on policies and procedures and again we're going to have a beautiful station done
this this June and some apparatus coming but that doesn't mean they're ready to go yet. So we still got a lot of work to do on the the trucks and the equipment once they're turned over to us. I mentioned the end part and I think we can go to next steps. So tonight we're hoping for approval of
the job description of the fire chief and authorized recruitment. Again we start that soon. I've been doing some some recruiting, calling people that I think would be good for the role. Um, well, hopefully we'll come back to you in February with the uh the hope with
the approval to go with the fire captain's job description and authorized recruitment and the part-time firefighters at the same time. And then later this summer, you come whoever the fire chief is would come back for authorization for the full-time firefighters. I stand for questions.
>> Thank you. Council questions. Chief Scott, >> Madame Mayor. >> Yes, sir. >> So, I know it's I might be jumping the gun a little bit here because you talked about we'll come back in February for the other positions, but
if we're bumping up hiring some of these positions earlier and getting them the equipment earlier, what's the what's the financial impact? How much more are we going to spend? Mayor, council. Uh that's something Chief Scott and I have been working on and we're putting together.
We're trying to find that white right wage scale uh for the ATO fire department. So, we're gathering data from other departments that have full-time staffing and what those look like and uh we are awaiting the scoring of the captain uh job description right
at this point. So, we're kind of waiting to see where that falls on our wage scale. Uh but council member Dunlap is right. the budget did not account for the hiring timeline proposed this evening. Uh there will be some impact and staff would certainly bring some options for the council uh as part of
that consideration, but something that we would bring before you uh we ask you to make that decision. >> Other questions or comments? >> Um Madam Mayor? >> Yes. Um, so I would imagine the the kind of the reconfiguration of the budgeting
for for the timeline change um is going to include some of the offsets too of the training that we don't have to pay for outside of the community and that type of thing as well. Um, I would imagine that would be a part of that whole
re re-evaluation so we can see the full picture for as it is. uh Mayor Council uh can work with Chief Scott to determine if you know if there are savings from having the department staff do some of the training what that would be. It certainly is not going to
offset the entire uh schedule change but >> yeah I understand that. >> Thank you. Other questions or comments? Madam Mayor, >> yes, >> Chief Scott, um, thank you for the
presentation. Um, would would the interviews be conducted by by you and then city 8 and then some point? It's the council has pres presented that or would we be part of the interviewing process?
>> Great, great question. Uh, council member Tanner, you're you're referencing for the fire chief. Is that correct? >> Yeah. So, citygate citygate wouldn't play a role in it. What we would recommend is definitely having some of your neighboring fire chiefs involved in the process. Um, they really need to be
on board with the type of leader you select. I mean, definitely mayor and counsel would be involved with it as well. So, we're kind of working out some of the details of that right now, but we definitely have reached out to um Chief Poland and um and we're looking at potentially um St. Michael, you know,
some some of our partners within our our county to be part of that and then definitely mayor and council because you have to be happy with that selection as well. >> That sounds great. >> Mike, I have a question. Well, kind of a comment again. Thank you for this
information tonight, but is there also going to be an option? Um, we had requests from people to kind of give a road map of where we're at and what the plans are for the station and what this looks like. Um, we had talked about that
back in December. And so I'm hoping that this information tonight could be presented to the public so that they can kind of see things like in an openhouse style or however you'd like to set that up. But is that an option that you're able to do? I know that obviously you're
going to also be busy looking to recruit a fire chief or an ex fire chief. But um is that something that you're still able to provide for us? >> So we we staff has discussed options of you know having an openhouse type feel. Um, you know, we've discussed it with
citygate and just with the timeline right now, I don't want to, my suggestion is not to put the brakes on to have that open house, but rather, you know, my suggestion would be to get get the fire chief on board and then have more of an open house, kind of a meet the fire chief and then, you know, I
picture more hopefully the station's further along by then potentially even have the open house at the station, have some of the equipment on display, understand where we're going. Um, and you know what, a great opportunity to try to recruit people from the community to get involved as part-time firefighters.
>> Okay. >> Any other questions or comments? >> So, for what you're asking for tonight, Madame Mayor, I have a question. Um, what you're asking for tonight is approval to start posting, doing a job posting and looking for a candidate.
Doesn't necessarily mean that we're hiring anyone or pulling the trigger on any financial component. I'm just trying to create a little clarity. So, we um, everyone understands what we're getting into when we're making the approval tonight. >> Yep. Correct. Yeah. So tonight we're
asking for permission to start the process to recruit advertise for your your future fire chief which again um I mean council member downlap brings up a great point about the budget being adjusted for the other positions which is something we're going to work through
but this position was in the budget was it's not a new position the money's there um and again fire chief's positions have been there's been a lot of turnover in the metro area so I think the sooner we can start doing that the better and and again we're just at that
crucial time right now. So long answer to your question, but yes, we're asking for permission to start that process and and definitely we'd still have to come back to you for approval of whoever that final candidate is and you guys would be involved in that process. >> I appreciate the detail. Thank you,
>> Corey. >> Yes. If uh no more discussion, I'd like to make a motion to approve the fire chief's job description and to authorize recruitment. >> Second motion by Corey, seconded by Michelle.
Is there any discussion? >> Madam Mayor, >> yes. >> Um I guess I just want to say I appreciate the the memo that we got from Citygate. Uh but there is sort of one
glaring contradiction when I read it. So, I want to read uh one of the sentences here. While shared services are growing are a growing trend in Minnesota, failure to have a comprehensive plan in place before implementing can lead to costly failures. It's on page two. Couple
paragraphs later, it says, "We recommend the city consider establishing a roadmap or a master plan for likely future steps in their fire department, including the hiring of a fire marshal, fire code, planchecking duties, uh, which is critical for a fast
growing community like Scott Seagull." The reason I think those two statements are contradictory is because we don't have a plan right now. Um the city of Orno had a fire department for about eight months before they decided to disband that department
and seek um a joint uh fire department with the cities that they used to contract with. We have 11 months uh which is roughly 22 council meetings by my count. Uh I think
that's the path we should be on. I think um I think spending more money until we have a plan is uh a dangerous step. As city gate has
pointed out, the thing that I will say I'm not really happy about thing I'm very frustrated about in fact is that we had a fire chief for three years and we do not have a plan. And that's
not the fault of anyone at the lectern right now. Um, but I do think it means we need to stop what we're doing, figure out what fire service looks like to the city of Oiggo, uh, and not spend another dime until we figure it out. So, I'm going to be a no
vote on this one. >> Great. There any other discussion? >> All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. All those opposed, same sign. >> I >> motion passes 3 to one.
>> Thanks, Mike. Thank you. Thank you. >> Moving on to item 6.1. Ryan, you had pulled item 3.3. >> Yes, Madame Mayor. Um, I oppose this action because our city is able to receive excellent service from our existing contract providers at a price point that is costefficient for the
taxpayer. If approved, these new charges will bring the total cost of owning our own fire department to 13,380,553.71. The money that we have spent so far would have paid for almost 10 years of excellent fire service from our neighbors.
>> Thank you, Corey. Madame Mayor, I'd like to make a motion to approve the the application number 13 in the amount of $1,512,200.76 cents for work completed on the fire station project. >> Second motion by Corey, seconded by
Michelle. Is there any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. >> All those opposed, same sign. I >> motion passes 3 to one. Uh, next we have our city council reports and updates. Uh, Heritage
Preservation Commission Cory. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Um, the Heritage Preservation Commission did not meet um last month. Um, lack a quorum. And that's all we got. >> Thank you. Parks and Recreation,
Michelle. >> Um, yes. Um we um reviewed some of the um uh the proposals for the park equipment for um Lily Pond and um great
presentations. The selection was made to move forward um in that design is u continuing and bids will or the documents will be sent up for bid here soon. Um more progress is um to be made for um
Prairie Park plus a bunch of other maintenance and stuff that's going on. Lots of usage of um the ice rink which is great. Not this week. >> No, absolutely. Prior to this week,
thank you. Ryan, planning commission. >> Uh mayor, the planning commission met last week uh to review the FOST swim school application that was on the council agenda tonight. They also reviewed uh potential updates to the accessory building and fence ordinances. Those updates will come to the council
at a later date. The next planning commission meeting is scheduled for Monday, February 2nd. >> Thank you. Public safety, uh, Council Member Gaty is absent. Um, so I will cover updates with that. Uh, we had Alina present. We
also had updates from Sergeant Olman's. um and updates from the chief which led us to what his information was tonight. Uh prior to that uh we Ryan and I were part of our first fire advisory
commission. Um I think that's our name is what we decided. Um, so we met with had a chance to meet with um, Adam, Mike, and Sabrina to get an update of where we were at and conversations with other um, service providers that the
city is working with. >> Um, >> do you guys have plans to meet with the other chiefs or how? >> We are anticipating that. We we have left that to staff. That is our goal to
um we had asked them to reach out and hopefully we can get a date on the books. We do not have one as of yet. >> That's a fair statement. >> All fair. Yes. Well done. >> Um but the plan is probably that we will
meet ahead of public safety in February or if not sooner. But we will call those advisory meetings. >> Yes, Mayor. Council, no defined meeting schedule at this point, but uh with a lot of work left to do in 2026, I
imagine there will be a monthly meeting perhaps. So, >> and we'll give an update at that time. >> All right, we are still under city council reports and updates. Does anyone have anything? All right, we will move on to staff
reports and updates. Item 7.1, consider scheduling a special city council meeting to discuss the 2026 street renewal project. >> Mayor, councel, thank you. Uh at the most recent public works subcommittee meeting, uh the two uh elected members and the rest of the subcommittee
reviewed the 2026 street renewal project. Uh it was advised that a special meeting of the full council would be beneficial. uh it is a project in an industrial area and uh there are two different alternatives for the type of improvements that can be done. Um and
also there are some funding things as far as the assessment policy and looking at the estimated costs that the group thought it would be good for the council to uh have at their discretion and review and discuss how you want to move forward. So uh staff would propose a
5:30 meeting on February 23rd. Uh that would be a night of a normal regular council meeting and there are no other special agenda topics for that evening at this point. So >> would 5:30 be >> uh yes 5:30 would be the recommendation. Yes. >> Okay.
>> Does that work for everyone? Yep, that works. >> Okay, then I will call a special meeting for February 23rd at 5:30 to discuss street renewal projects. >> Second. >> Motion by Jessica, seconded by Corey. Is there any discussion?
All those in favor signify by saying I. >> All those opposed, same sign. Motion passes. >> All right, we'll go. Adam. >> Yes. Thank you. Uh, mayor, council, I did send out a survey last week to you
to uh survey dates for availability on uh the previously discussed goal setting process. So, uh there were three dates that did align for all five of you. Uh staff would prefer February 26th uh that is a Thursday. Uh the proposed time was
a 5:00 pm start uh setting a work session. Uh staff would post notice of quorum uh for that. Uh we would not be asking you to make any decisions or take any action. This is goal setting. uh depending on how that process uh
materializes then we would uh organize your goals and bring them back to you for future uh adoption as your 2026 goal setting. So uh again the recommended date from staff standpoint would be
Thursday, February 26 at 5:00 p.m. >> That's okay. Staff will post that on the website as a notice of quorum and >> we all said yes it works. All right. Uh, I will send out a reminder for that. And then last thing I have, mayor, is just a
reminder, the I94 Quarter Coalition has their legislative preview breakfast next Friday morning. I know that does interfere with uh most of your attendance at the uh league training that day, but uh staff will be present uh and can update you at a later date.
>> Great. Thank you. Thank you. >> Do we need a motion for that February 26 meeting then? >> Uh, mayor, it's probably Yeah, sure. Why not? I could do that. So, Madame Mayor, I call for I I move for a special meeting on February 26th at 5:00 PM uh for the
council to discuss goal settings. >> Second. >> Motion by Ryan, seconded by Corey. We're meeting for February 26 at 5:00 p.m. Is there any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I.
>> All those opposed, same sign. >> Motion passes. >> Adam did uh I saw a picture. You guys must have went to the other grand opening at the condo suite. >> Oh yeah, mayor council. In my weekly update last week, there was a ribbon cutting hosted by the I94 West Chamber
of Commerce at the condo suit of at Sego. Uh good attendance from the chamber representatives. They also had their first um business owner that is purchased one of the contractor condos will be moving into that uh here shortly. So hopefully that's a trend
that we see businesses coming to see and using that space. So, >> did they list which business purchased it? >> Uh, yes, Mayor. It was Glasstastic. So, u small business. Uh, I think they said five employees. They do automotive. They do uh home window repairs and a
slew of other things window related. So, >> Ryan and I must have uh not did too big of a shebang with our ribbon cutting because they had a second one. >> Yes. >> Nothing else, Mayor. >> Okay. Thank you, >> Audra. >> Thank you, mayor. I was just going to
let everybody know that the advisory commission interviews have been scheduled for February 12th. >> There are eight um candidates. We are still waiting for one to confirm. And just you know, there were nine, but one did withdraw. And then just the last thing I had, um since nobody mentioned it, the winter
festival is February 7th starting at 10 a.m. >> Well, I'll be at our league train. Did we get any applicants for uh OPC? >> None actually signed up for OPC, but that'd be a question to ask those that
you're interviewing because there's not enough spots for everybody that did apply. >> Good. >> Thank you, Dave. >> Nothing to report. Thanks, Mayor. >> Thank you, Dan. Mayor, >> nothing to report. >> Ron,
>> nothing else. >> Okay. Sergeant Alman's. I've been sitting in the back watching the uh video and watching somebody dance. Do you want to say what's up? >> No.
>> I've been watching you watch the video of you dancing. So, it's pretty fun to fun to watch and we're talking about really boring stuff. So, I appreciate that stuff. So, thank you. >> Um, kind of business as usual for us. I kind of like I said, we've we've had a lot of our in-house trainings. We uh the SWAT team, we went down to a um a
building down in the metro that's a big vacant open building that's been for sale for about eight years. That's a huge office building that we get to go train in, which is super beneficial for us to have that type of building accessible for us. So, um otherwise like our medical training we always do here
in January. So, we just went through that and some of our use of force things. So, it's good to get those out of the way when it's really cold like this. Uh, for the most part, the cold hasn't affected us too badly as far as call volume goes. Um, sometimes it just adds different variables to the calls and so it's just a different set of
challenges when it's freezing out and you can't spend more than five minutes out uh, you know, maybe on like a DUI stop or something like that. We have to be very good on the articulation of what we're observing out there because quite frankly, you can't rely on any of anything anything out there when it's that cold. If you're shivering, well,
that's you can't use that as, you know, part of your report. So, um, otherwise, like I said, business as usual for us, uh, this time of year. U, I guess couple thank yous that I got to publicly do real quick. Um, uh, Ben Boyd with the city, the IT, um, he helped us out with
our internet. Uh we had some issues with our internet today and he did get me set up uh or he just ended up I think Nor out of frustration just said all right here's just your own Wi-Fi network. I appreciate that a lot of the guys have been appreciative that we got our stuff back up and running and I have my
computer back up and running on our own network. So that's that's super beneficial for us. Uh uh maybe we're a little whiny. I don't know. So um one of the detectives that's been uh working on a couple cases in the area. I can't really go into detail on the cases. Uh, sorry, Detective Blake Lamir been
working pretty uh hard on a couple cases up here that are really tough tough cases. So, I appreciate his hard work on that. And and finally, Mayor, I kind of I shared a story with you kind of over email here. So, kind of a um sometimes I come up here, I'm all doom and gloom, right? That's that's never fun. So, um
what started off as pretty pretty one of those calls it just kind of it tugs at your heart a little bit. So with the cold temperatures, there was a family that get got displaced from their home uh because their furnace went out and one of those days that was like -20. Uh so they spent some time uh in the hotel
because that's all they they could really get to is something very local and they had to get out of their house like really quick because there was some concerns there. Um as all parents I guess would know maybe when you're sitting in a very small hotel room with your entire family for an extended period of time without your normal
amenities. Um, frustration maybe gets the best of some people. This one boiled over a little bit more than what you would usually see and there was some drinking involved, etc. Uh, so we ended up getting a call and having to problem solve a few different things. Uh, one of those resolutions ended up being,
why don't we all just separate for a little bit. So, we ended up basically helping out the family by driving the dad away, but the p the kids, the three kids that were there were just seeing the cops showing up after mom and dad fighting. and uh an officer basically taking taking
that away. That's how they viewed it. You know, they didn't recognize, hey, you know, it's just kind of adult things. Same things happen. We're just trying to problem solve. Um I was able to look at the kids and I go, you guys kind of had to go out of the house pretty quick, huh? They're like, yeah, like see these guys didn't get any toys when you left, right? Um the Eagle Lions
and through the gifts anonymous program that they have, it's typically just every Christmas, right? Yep. So, um, the mayor typically grabs a bunch of those for us for the sheriff's office that we gonna keep. I keep a handful of things in my squad car. So, in this case, I literally was able to go run down to my
squad car. I got lucky. Two sets of Hot Wheels for the two boys and I had a little make build a princess thing that I kept back there. You know how many questions I can ask when people are in the backseat of my squad car and they see a build a princess uh thing back there. And so I was happy to give that one away. But that was crazy because the
the mom, you know, mom's tearing up and um the kids all of a sudden completely just the demeanor completely changed on that. So um that really took a experience I think that the kids were going to have that core memory of something really really negative and really turned it to a positive because we have that availability through the
Oseo Lions and everything that they do for us on that. So that was really cool. So big thanks to the Oseo Lions and the mayor for setting that up for us. So that's a big deal. um that kind of saved our butts quite frankly on that one for the future even. So >> we're glad to help. >> So other than that, I think that's all I have.
>> Jason, did um break county get involved in that abduction in Zimmerman at all? >> Uh so the one of the captains for the Sherburn County Sheriff's Office contacted uh Sergeant Cotton. Sergeant Cotton's in charge of our K9 program. Um
who is the right person to call quite frankly? He's a regional expert. He does a lot of the training uh for dogs. I mean, if if there's he's probably got a you know, been a part of the training for like half the dogs, K9 units in the in the state at this point. Uh they had
contacted him said, "This is what we have and this is the this is the scenario." Um in typical Sergeant Cotton fashion, he says, "I I don't know what I can do, but I'm Yep. I'm on my way right now." He grabbed the dog. He was out the door. He made a call to our other Kane, one of the other K9 units that was
working that day and said, "I don't care what you're doing. You're dropping it. We're going up there now." Um, so they went up there. Sergeant Cotton also is a um has good connections with the Northstar Rescue Group, which has search and rescue dogs, has drones, different things, specifically a volunteer
organization that does uh rescue things. So if they went up there, like I said, Sergeant Cotton would within a second he was out the door, had his stuff on. That was his day off. >> That was absolutely his day off. I mean, he's taking a phone call, he's out the door in negative 20 weather and he's up there in 20 minutes. So, yeah, we
something like that. That is absolutely something that Sheriff Daringer is like, "Nope, get up there. If you guys can help in any capacity, get up there." >> That's good. That was a quite a outpouring between the communities and people just dropping whatever they're doing and heading up there. So
>> yeah, >> when he when he was up there, he said, Sergeant Cotton specifically said he was like, I'm not really the pulling your heartstrings type of guy, but he was like that was very touching to see like how many people kind of and in one of those moments goes, I know they're not asking us to come, but the entire
community was like, we're still showing up kind of thing. So it they they were putting in some work when it was like I said, 20 below and um there was like 200 cops in some capacity, law enforcement and all the different agencies. Thank you.
>> Thank you. Anyone have anything? >> Thank you. >> Thanks, Sergeant. >> Much stay warm. >> All right. If no one else has anything, then a motion to adjourn would be in order. >> We'll move. >> Second. Motion by Corey, seconded by Michelle. Is there any discussion? All
those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> All those opposed, same sign. The meeting has ended. Thank you all for attending.